What is it? A kitten or crossbreed rat/gerbil? I'm sorry, i'm not the vet, you are remember?! Tell me how you did the lighting to disappear in the background into black? That's really cool.
A kitten! I used a surgery hot lights to "short light" the kitten. Crossed 2 at about 60º so that the fall off went to either side, leaving the background a nice black gradient.
great capture of the vulnerability with your choice of composition - and the pink nose is a wonderful contrast to the rest of the muted colors. (and so cute!)